Your headcanons

Jr is an extremely lonely individual who doesn't know how to make friends properly.
 
Ever since it was confirmed that the Koopalings aren't Bowser's children, I often think of Bowser being their "stepfather"; he's not related to them, but adopted them nonetheless.
 
MnSG said:
Ever since it was confirmed that the Koopalings aren't Bowser's children, I often think of Bowser being their "stepfather"; he's not related to them, but adopted them nonetheless.
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I'm so glad, in this sense, that the UK page, the German page and, most importantly, the Italian page of SMB3 still report them as being offspring, not adopted.

You know I still go with the disinherited biological children headcanon.

Funnily enough, in the Italian version of Color Splash the "Bowser's minions" term was suppressed from the main lines of the story and when they explicitly refer to Bowser, they don't use the adjective "Master", they just call him Bowser. Only Morton uses the word "capo" (boss), not explicitly referred to Bowser. And, of course, even though the preview site called them "Bowser's minions", in the final game "Bowserotti" (Little Bowsers) is used instead, just like in the other games since Paper Jam. They even modified one line of the dialogue with Larry to use that term. I hope to have the game for Christmas so I can clarify this more (although I'm pretty sure that there won't be nothing interesting like what was seen in Paper Jam, more probably a translation oddity from Nintendo Italia, facilitated by them using the "Bowserotti" term instead of "Bowser's minions" even in games that weren't supposed to have it).
 
The Koopalings are Bowser's kids the same way Bowser is Kamek's son.

He's not their biological father, but he is raising them (with Kamek) to be powerful wizards. You could say he's their father, but he sees himself more as an instructor.

Where did these kids come from? He took them from the homes of other Koopa families (except Lemmy, he was given away voluntarily).
 
Magikrazy said:
The Koopalings are Bowser's kids the same way Bowser is Kamek's son.

He's not their biological father, but he is raising them (with Kamek) to be powerful wizards. You could say he's their father, but he sees himself more as an instructor.

Where did these kids come from? He took them from the homes of other Koopa families (except Lemmy, he was given away voluntarily).
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I know that my opinion, even if supported by official text, is unpopular. From what I've seen in DeviantArt comments and "YouTube theories" videos, the "adopted children" theory is more popular among fans of the Koopalings!

Simply put, when I grew up, it was obvious that Kamek wasn't Bowser's father (yes, we played Yoshi's Island, I remember when I was talking to my friend saying that it was out and soon after he bought it!) and that the Koopalings were Bowser's children (we were told that so clearly at the time, remember that there was quite some Mario related material at the time, even though I skipped most of it as we were mostly into the games...), but honestly, very few people of my age care about this topic (which is very good after all, as at this point there should be more important priorities!), and all the people from the N64 era onward have no reason to bother about it.
Ironically, though, in a graduation party of a friend slightly older than me a crossword puzzle was made, and one of the question was "How many children does Bowser have in Super Mario Bros. 3?"; no need to tell that some of the friends of mine there, when we played Mario Kart 8 together, immediately recognized the Koopalings, while there were some problems with Rosalina...

Just know that I'll always be highly unpopular, repetitive and quite stubborn on the matter - sorry for that, by the way. I also know that I might "lose" in the end, I probably already lost, but who cares at this point? I feel like the maintainers of those European SMB3 pages (who are probably the same ones of the SMA4 pages, judging from what happened with their last update) who stubbornly keep "offspring" with every page update even if few people support this view, and surely nobody from NCL. Surprising that those people are still there, if they haven't been replaced already...

P.S.: as soon as I'll have the money I think I'll buy the Shogakukan guides of SMW and Super Mario All-Stars (1993 edition of the latter if I can) to have a better look at how the Koopalings were depicted at the time in Japan - a recent rediscovery showed that SMB3 wasn't the only game having material that considered them Bowser's children, and I'm intrigued to know if this is an exception - likely - or not. After all, a bowling ball in the face is more spectacular than just a slap, if anything there will be that awesome comic in English complete with Mario swearing (SMW guide) and that caption in the image of the redesign of Bowser that happened to have four Koopalings (Super Mario All-Stars guide).
 
What do you mean you "already lost"? It's your headcanon, man. If you want to believe it, believe it. It doesn't have to match up exactly with what Miyamoto says or thinks.
 
Magikrazy said:
What do you mean you "already lost"? It's your headcanon, man. If you want to believe it, believe it. It doesn't have to match up exactly with what Miyamoto says or thinks.
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I was not referring to my headcanon.
I was rather referring to this official depiction of the Koopalings as Bowser's offspring instead of adopted children, that still survives in the European sites agaisnt all odds. Since not even a good part of the fanbase nor NCL support this depiction anymore, I see slim chances of it staying, unless of course it's actually supported by official depictions made at the time by NCL themselves, which is something I would be curious to know - I'd be really intrigued to know more about how the Koopalings were conceived and designed beside that "they were based on SMB3 staff", especially after seeing that picture of Bowser's redesign that is attributed to Super Mario Bros. 2 (Super Mario Bros.: The Lost Levels here) and thus might move the Koopalings introduction to 1986, possibly even earlier, instead of 1988.
 
It's pretty easy to ignore what Miyamoto says about the Koopalings because it can apply either way. If he didn't say anything, the story wouldn't have changed much. The thought of the Koopalings being Bowser's children is firmly entrenched in many people's minds that it's kind of hard to let go of that. My headcanon ignores Miyamoto, simple. It also makes up a bunch of crazy things the official Mario would likely contradict, such as Mario really disliking Donkey Kong and Wario.
 
LeftyGreenMario said:
It's pretty easy to ignore what Miyamoto says about the Koopalings because it can apply either way. If he didn't say anything, the story wouldn't have changed much. The thought of the Koopalings being Bowser's children is firmly entrenched in many people's minds that it's kind of hard to let go of that. My headcanon ignores Miyamoto, simple. It also makes up a bunch of crazy things the official Mario would likely contradict, such as Mario really disliking Donkey Kong and Wario.
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Well, even if the focus is tipycally on the second part of the sentence, Miyamoto himself was smart enough that he did talk about "current story", in order to clearly state that he wasn't referring neither to the past (although the Encyclopedia tried "changing" the original SMB3 story, only to be "exposed" a year later with the release of the Famicom Mini and the scans of the original manuals...) nor to the future - keeping the various possibilities open is always smart, considering how Nintendo and the Mario franchise as a consequence are at a turning point.
There's a reason after all why we say in the Wiki that there's no canon in the franchise and why this thread can thrive without having to worry much about what is the current depiction of characters according to NCL - which itself tends to be as barebone as it can be. Headcanons by themselves don't need to follow official depictions, much less so those that deal with depictions that might be subject to change.
 
And as I pointed out before, Miyamoto was just the one to reveal this info, not the only one who made the decision to implement this change.